Ethernet is the preferred protocol for many types of networks because it is flexible, decentralized, and scalable. Ethernet comprises a family of frame-based computer networking technologies for local area networks (LANs), and defines a number of wiring and signaling standards for the Physical Layer of the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) networking model and a common addressing format and Media Access Control (MAC) at the Data Link Layer. Ethernet is flexible in that it allows variable-sized data packets to be transported across different types of mediums using various nodes each having different transmission speeds. In many networks, such as Ethernet networks, the nodes synchronize their transmissions by exchanging a plurality of timing references or timestamps.